Crabby can be good...

Happy Easter Weekend friends! I wanted to post a most delicious recipe for you all to enjoy as summer approaches. This is such a delicious way to prepare crab cakes, the recipe is courtesy of Southern Living, my favorite magazine. They are sweet yet savory! My Mr. and I have throughly enjoyed them and they aren't half bad reheated for lunches either! We also decided to try them as mini crab cake sliders. We got these amazing pretzel rolls from Costco(our favorite store) and put just a little bit of mustard on the bun. DELISH! I didn't make the cilantro/jalepeno/sour cream sauce. So if you make that let me know how it turns out!

ENJOY!

Ingredients:

1 lb lump crab meat (It is much more affordable at stores like Costco and Sam's club)

2/3 cup red bell pepper

1/2 cup sliced green onions

2 teaspoons EVOO

1 garlic clove, minced

1/3 cup mayonaise

1/4 cup parsley

2 large eggs lightly beaten

1 tsp hot sauce (Use franks red hot cause it's so much better than anything else)

1 tsp old bay seasoning

1 tsp lemon zest

2 cups cornbread crumbs (I cheated and used a Jiffy mix, worked just fine)

Sauté bell pepper and onions in hot oil in a small nonstick skillet over medium-high heat 1 minute; add garlic, and sauté 1 minute. Remove from heat; cool 15 minutes.

Bake cornbread while you are prepping your ingredients and sauteing peppers, onions, and garlic.

Combine bell pepper mixture, mayonnaise, and next 5 ingredients in a large bowl.

Fold in cornbread and crabmeat.

Shape mixture into cakes, place on a lightly greased baking sheet, cover loosely with plastic wrap and chill for at least 1 hour.

Lightly coat cakes with cooking spray. ( I just put some more EVOO on the pan and it was fine.) Cook crab cakes, in batches, in a large nonstick skillet or griddle over medium heat 3 to 4 minutes on each side or until lightly browned. Serve immediately.

nom nom nom......

This is what John and I did, crab cake sliders on pretzel rolls with mustard! YUM!

However you decide to make them, enjoy this is a fabulous and easy recipe!

For the original recipe go here!

XOXO

The Mrs.

Spring Blooms!

One of the amazing things about living here in VA is the Springtime. I am fortunate to not suffer from allergies like many of you fellow springtime lovers, or haters depending on the severity of your allergies. This year is the first time I have ever experienced a real Spring.

Growing up in South Florida everything is always bloomed and always green year round. And in Idaho the weather seemed to jump from Winter to Summer over night, and Spring was the extension of Winter that caused the snow to go from beautiful and white to brown and muddy. But not here! Here, Spring is a true renewal of life! It is beautiful and vibrant and colorful! John and I went to Downtown DC to experience the 100th annual Cherry Blossom festival.

GORGEOUS!

If you ever have an opportunity to go I highly suggest it. You have to time the trip just right because depending on the weather the blooms only last roughly 1 week! But they are a beautiful site to see! The entire water front is just lined with the most brilliant pink and white cherry blossoms! It was so much fun and maybe even bumped Spring up fairly close to Fall on my favorite seasons list! Enjoy the pics and Happy Spring!!

Easiest Nanner Bread EVER!

There is something so delicious about home made bread. I often don't take the time to make it, but when I do I sure am glad! John and I live joyously close to a Costco now and we picked up some 9 bananas on our last trip for 1.50! We ate most of them fresh but it was coming down to the end and there were just a few left and they were browning. So I decided to make Nanner bread. This is the easiest bread recipe ever! So easy and quick! And it is so lovely and moist and delicious! Hope you try and enjoy cause I certainly did!

Ingredients:

3-4 large ripe bananas

2 cups self-rising flour

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup canola oil

2 eggs, lightly beaten

1/2 cup (or as much as you want) of your favorite semi sweet chocolate chunks/chips. I use Ghiradelli semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions:

Mash the nanners with a fork, stir the flour and sugar together, mix with bananas, oil and eggs. Fold in chocolate chips. Pour into a greased and floured loaf pan. Bake for 1 hour at 325, or until the top is golden brown and a knife inserted comes out clean.

Allow to cool in pan for a few minutes and run a knife around the edge for a clean removal! Let cool on a wire rack and then store in foil and enjoy!!

Happy Saturday Everyone!! Now eat your nanners!

xoxo

The Mrs.

EAT YOUR VEGGIES!

I know what your thinking. Brussels Sprouts. Ew. Gross. Who eats those anymore? This chica right here. Cause not only are they super delicious when cooked properly, but they are extremely beneficial to have in your diet. They provide DNA stability in our white blood cells, they help decrease risk of cancer developing, they lower your cholesterol, they are high in Vitamin C, and are a good source of potassium which helps keep your heart healthy. Convinced you need to eat some? My sister in law Rachel got me hooked on these little green jewels of veggies. Over new years she made some down at their river house. She used a recipe that had bacon and was super delicious. However we can no longer find her recipe, so I had to go in search of something else to do with these little baby cabbages.

Hope you enjoy this recipe as I even got my husband to eat some I think they are a hit.

Take your brussels sprouts and trim the stems, cute them in half and rub olive oil on both sides of the sprouts. Or if you are lazy just toss them lightly with a few glugs of olive oil in a bowl.

Preheat a pan to medium with about a teaspoon of olive oil in it. Make sure it's not too hot or you will sear the sprouts before they can cook to their tender perfection. Place the cut side down on the pan and Sprinkle with salt and fresh ground pepper to taste. Cook covered for about 5-8 minutes or until a tender to a fork in the center of the largest sprouts. The bottom should be a light brown in color and they should just barely be starting to caramelize.

Once your sprouts look like this they are almost done, Start turning them over onto their rounded sides gently to get a little bit of the caramelizing going on all sides. For this specific recipe it said to sprinkle some finely grated cheese over the top. I decided to use Costco's Chipotle White Cheddar. However parmesan, gouda, or gruyere would also be delicious. Eat them right away when they are hot for best taste.

Hope you guys like this fresh recipe, they really are delicious if cooked properly.

xoxo

The Mrs.

FAMILY IS FOREVER

John and Bryant doing their scary faces.

So lately I have been thinking about how grateful I am for family. I love my parents so much, they have done so much for me and have helped me become someone I am really proud to be. I also love my sister to pieces. Lately I have been missing her a lot because she is Prego. I am SOOOO excited to be an Aunt. I want to spoil her baby and give that kid so many presents! She is about 15 weeks along so I still have to wait a while for her to pop the kid out, but I am so so excited for when she does. It's going to be awesome!! BAH!

On that note. I can't neglect my other 14 nieces and nephews on my husbands side of the family. They are stinking adorable and I love to spend as much time with them as possible. This last weekend was my niece Kelsey's Birthday. She turned 7. So precious. Each year the kids in that family are allowed to pick the menu for their birthday dinner. This year Kelsey chose Costco pizza. haha. This is an improvement over last years choice of fruit snacks. Nevertheless, Rachel being an awesome mom was able to get some fruit and veggies in there for the adults as well as having Troy smoke some pizzas on the smoker. YUM.

I know this is a random post but I just love family so much, both immediate and extended and I am always feeling super blessed that I have such great people on both sides. YAY Families.

This is me and my 2 yr old nephew Brennan doing our scary faces haha.

The Game of Life

So everyone that knows me knows I love playing board games. I could play an Hasbro game any time any place and have a blast. Lately I feel like I have been playing the game of LIFE. Maybe it's just cause I'm approaching 25 way too quickly... but It seems like I'm hitting all those Life stops. You know, get a degree, get married, get a job, get a promotion.... Oh yes that brings me to the purpose of this post.

I GOT A PROMOTION!

haha. I am very excited to announce that I am now the Surgical Scheduler for the Virginia Spine Institute. I get my own office and a raise. Pretty cool huh? Not bad for only working at VSI for 7 months.

If you would have told me 2 years ago when I graduated BYU-Idaho that I would be doing what I do now I would of looked at you like you were crazy. I have never been interested in a medical career and then bam side door opens and smacks me in the face. Now I'm learning how to schedule OR procedures and communicating with Reston Hospital every day and learning about surgery clearances and laminectomies and spondylosis. It's crazy. And what's even more crazy is that I absolutely LOVE it.

Weird. Whats next on the board of LIFE do you suppose?

xoxo

The Mrs.

Home Sweet Home

As many of you know by now, John and I ended up moving from his parents house into a beautiful 2 bed 2 bath condo. YAY! It is so exciting to be on our own schedule and have all of our wonderful wedding presents back out and in use. We are making decent progress unpacking....

haha I swear its much better than this right now, but I'm waiting until I have the place decorated before I post finished pictures. That picture above is of the kitchen. I know hard to recognize...

Anyway we are loving the new place, everyone is super friendly in our new Ward too which is a HUGE bonus. The neighborhood we are living in is pretty quiet and super convenient to Costco, a mall, and all sorts of delicious eateries!

xoxo

The Mrs.